


Not a Cat Person

by servantofclio



Series: Zoe Ryder [11]
Category: Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: Cats, F/M, her name still isn't Sara
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-15
Updated: 2017-09-15
Packaged: 2018-12-30 06:43:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 849
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12102999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/servantofclio/pseuds/servantofclio
Summary: Ryder gets the pick of the litter.





	Not a Cat Person

They’d talked about pets, once, one of those late-night conversations about things they’d left behind in the Milky Way that was like gingerly picking around the edges of a scab, a weird mix of nostalgia and painful.

“Gerbils,” Zoe said. “Zach and I each got a gerbil for our tenth birthday. Mine died in two months. Zach’s lived until it was the crankiest geriatric gerbil you ever saw.”

“Like Drack?” Peebee put in.

Zoe imagined the long-ago gerbil with a bone-armor collar and snickered. “Sorta. I always wanted a cat, though.”

“Oh, I love cats!” Suvi put in. “My folks had the sweetest tabby-cat when I was young, she always curled up with me and purred at night.” Her face fell and she bit her lip, trying not to drag down the mood.

Liam rescued her. “Not a cat person.”

Suvi’s wistfulness gave way to outrage. “You don’t like cats? How?”

“Never said I don’t like ‘em, just don’t understand ‘em. How they stare at you. Give me dogs any day.”

The conversation promptly devolved into an argument about the merits of cats and dogs, with Suvi, Liam, and Gil all chiming in, while the non-human crew looked on with various shades of bewilderment. After a few moment, Peebee dived in with wholly uninformed opinions. Just to stir things up, Zoe was pretty sure. Zoe shrugged and sat back. Her mom’s allergies had ruled out both kinds of pets, leaving her without much relevant experience.

“Sid always wanted some kind of pet,” Vetra said to Zoe after a while, with the other four still going at it. “But it never seemed practical.”

“Oh, no doubt,” Zoe said. “I’m sure Sid was fine without.”

The argument the rest of them were having reached a crescendo: Liam declared, “And that’s why I’m not a cat person,” while Gil and Peebee dissolved into laughter and Suvi sighed, looking vexed. Zoe had completely lost the thread. She grinned at Liam anyway, because he looked so pleased with himself.

It wasn’t as if cats were likely to be an issue any time in the near future, anyway.

Zoe came to that conclusion, of course, without reckoning on Sid Nyx’s determination.

_Months later:_

“Oh my goooooooood,” Zoe breathed, staring at the squirming, mewing bundles of fluff in front of her.

“I know we’re still kinda securing a food supply,” Sid said, “but I figure people could use the morale boost too, right? And you would not believe how long a waiting list there already is. Or what people are promising me if I move them higher on it.”

Zoe dropped to her knees and reached toward the pile of kittens, hesitating at the last moment. “Can I?”

“Oh, sure. It’s supposed to be good for their socialization.”

Zoe plunged her hands into the pile and emerged with a black-and-white kitten who immediately started gnawing on her thumb.

“How much are people offering you?” Liam asked Sid, standing back while Zoe lay down with the kittens.

Sid told him.

Liam whistled. “Gonna do dogs next?”

“Sure, if I can find them in the gene banks. Which ones are dogs again?”

Zoe ignored the conversation for a while. Sid had gotten some toys — a couple pieces of string, a little stuffed ball made of scraps — and watching the kittens romp around after the toys, chasing, pouncing, jumping straight up into the air was absolutely intoxicating. She had lost her heart to half a dozen multi-colored balls of fluff with enormous pointed ears.

She looked helplessly up at Liam from her position flat on the floor. The black and white kitten had climbed up on her stomach and then fallen over, evidently exhausted by the effort. An orange kitten had followed and was awkwardly licking its own paw. “I can’t move,” she said.

“Yeah, that’s a problem,” Liam said, smiling at her indulgently. “C’mon, it’s a tiny bit of a thing.”

“I might wake it up,” she said, petting the orange kitten with the tip of her finger. “Liam, look at their itty bitty feet!”

“They’re cute enough,” he allowed.

“I can’t decide which one I want. I can have one, can’t I, Sid?”

“You’re first on my list,” Sid called from the other side of the room. “But I can only give you one.”

“There you go, first cat in Andromeda. Pathfinding has its perks,” Liam said.

“But I can’t decide!”

The orange kitten, distracted by the antics of its littermates, bounded off. Liam shrugged. “Looks like that one’s picked you. It’s the classy one, anyway.”

“You think?” Zoe cautiously slid a hand under the sleeping black and white kitten.

“Obviously. Look at his little tuxedo. Classy cat like that can go anywhere.”

The kitten, roused, blinked round blue eyes at her and put a tiny paw on her nose. Zoe grinned at it. “I guess you’re right.”

“I thought you said you weren’t a cat person,” Zoe said, watching Tuxedo bat at Liam’s hair while riding on his shoulder.

Liam shrugged, absently scratching the kitten’s ears. “Changed my mind. Think Sid will give us another one?”


End file.
